Feds Want Search Data To Justify Anti-Pornography Effort

Danny Sullivan is tracking the breaking news on the US government’s efforts to get data about searches from search engine companies to support its defense of the Child Online Protection Act (COPA):

[from Bush Administration Demands Search Data; Google Says No; AOL, MSN & Yahoo Said Yes]

It’s important to note that from what I read, the requests do not involve user data at all. Shutting off your cookies or purging your personalized search data wouldn’t protect you with this request, because the request wasn’t going after personal data. To stress again:

    * According to the report, they wanted a list of one million web addresses. Not who went to the web pages and when, just a list of URLs picked randomly.

      

    * They wanted searches for one week. I haven’t seen the court documents, but I’m guessing Google could have handed over a list of searches that were entirely unassociated with IP addresses, times, cookies and registration information. Nothing suggests that they wanted to know who did the searches in any way.

Having said this, such a move absolutely should breed some paranoia. They didn’t ask for data this time, but next time, they might. Of course, it bears reminding that this type of data is easily obtainable from ISPs. So even if the search engines refuse to comply, your own ISP could be giving up your data — or selling it.

That’s my concern: the precedent of them asking for this data, and Google et al simply handing it over. Especially this government.

Thank goodness at least Google seems to have that issue in mind, unlike the others, who simply hand the info over.

[Update: Chris Nolan jumps into this mess, wondering why Google would resist:

[from Spot-On: Chris Nolan: Google This]

I have to say that I’m honestly surprised that Google has decided to engage in this show-down. One of the reasons I have steadfastly refused to use Google’s GMail is because I don’t trust that corporation - or any other - to maintain my privacy. When you’re in the business of keeping secrets and not telling people where or how you get information, having private email is a good, good thing. And I know enough and am grossly cynical about Silicon Valley and its business people to know that in circumstances where the choice is business or principle, business is gonna win. As The New York Times story observed: If Google loses its court battle, it will, in fact comply with the subpoena.

That’s not to say Google is run by nasty folks or spineless creeps.
It’s not. But it has investors and shareholders and they have made
those investments for one reason: To make money. The more the better.
It’s safe to say that’s why American OnLine (owned by Time Warner),
Microsoft and Yahoo have not objected as strenuously to giving the
government information. It
is why those companies comply with requests for information from
foreign governments that we here in this country would - or should -
consider illegal. Generally speaking - unless you’re in the news
business and even then you better have a good lawyer - picking fights
with the government in not good for business.

But then Google’s business depends on it having our trust - as a
business and as individuals. In the long run, it is good for business
for them to have this fight. The politics of its management and
investors - they in many respects embody that group I call Progressive libertarians
- also offer a sense of how the company feels about the Bush
Administration. Not good is a good enough description for now. So we
have an interesting moment to contemplate here; the Silicon Valley and
the Administration have squared off - over porn, of course - and it’s
not clear who’s going to win. It would be nice to say this is a
slam-dunk for Google. But it’s not.

This is more troubling because the government is making - in the
Google case - an argument no different in theory than the one it makes
for wiretapping: We are doing this to protect you. The Justice
Department was information about porn searches so it can shore up a
much-dismissed law; it says it is protecting children. In listening to
phone conversations without court supervision, the government says the
same thing: We are protecting you from terrorists.

The issue here isn’t protection. It never is. It’s about control.

PS Chris is looking for a Tech Law contributor for Spot-on, too.]